Wednesday, October 01, 2014

Social Workers' Ethical Responsibilities as Professionals

It can't be stressed enough how important familiarity with the NASW Code of Ethics can be for easing your way through the social work licensing exam. Yes, there are content questions on the exam that require you knowing specifics about theory, about diagnosis, etc. You can cram that information into your brain any which way you prefer. But the majority of exam questions require more subtlety and understanding of what it means to be a social worker. Scenario questions presenting situations that don't have an obvious solution can trip people up on the exam. For those, get prepared by giving the Code of Ethics a careful read, reread, and rereread.

Here, to encourage you in that, are section-by-section links to part four of the code, Social Workers' Ethical Responsibilities as Professionals. It's buried in the middle of the code's six sections--not first, not last, not least.
  • 4.01 Competence
  • 4.02 Discrimination
  • 4.03 Private Conduct
  • 4.04 Dishonesty, Fraud, and Deception
  • 4.05 Impairment
  • 4.06 Misrepresentation
  • 4.07 Solicitations
  • 4.08 Acknowledging Credit
As you browse through, see if you can think up potential exam items that each section lends itself to. If you're feeling really ambitious and generous, post them in comments!

Update: Code no longer hosted at msu.edu. Use the NASW version instead.

2 comments:

Mamaknowsbest said...

These are so huge on the exam which I took and past 3 weeks ago; I cannot stress enough how vital truly understanding our code of ethics is. Best of luck to you all!

Unknown said...

I get hearing the same thing. I am taking the exam this week. "For the third time" But, this time I realized the importance of truly knowing the code. I also know that it has a lot to do with application, not book knowledge.